Contents

History

Runes have existed since the creation of RuneScape. They have had times of shortage and prosperity, and even times where they were forgotten. Yet, currently they are in massive quantity.

When Guthix shaped Gielinor in the early first age, he used the power of the Stone of Jas, an ancient relic left by the Elder Gods, to create runestones, so that all of Gielinors inhabitants could use magic. When Guthix's powers drained, he hid the stone and delved into a deep sleep. Humans like Jack began using the magic, learning spells and naming them.

But the use of magic made the runestones slowly disappear from the world, making it a very rare supply during the Second Age. Many battles were held by many Wizards in attempt to obtain some of the remaining runes in Gielinor. As the God Wars raged on centuries later, the rune supply depleted due to extensive use in battles. The humans in the Fourth Age were left undefended and vulnerable.

At the end of the Fourth Age, a FremennikSeer discovered an ancient cave beneath the eastern mountains of the Fremennik Province, or, according to Wizard Sedridor, in a cave beneath the North. In this cave he found the Stone of Jas that Guthix hid. In the time it was hidden, it had created the Rune Essence rocks. Eventually, the Stone was taken away by "those who walk a higher astral path". However, the essence rocks were not. The seer who discovered the mines learned how to harness energy into them, creating runes.

With the knowledge of crafting runes, he went to Misthalin to show the magic you could cast with these stones. Soon, the knowledge of magic spread through all of the human kingdoms and with this knowledge the power of the kingdoms grew incredibly fast. The Wizard's Tower was built and became the centre of all magical studies. Some Fremenniks traveled south to create Runecrafting Altars all across the world, so all humans could craft runes themselves easily and thus the runes became everything but rare.

The group Fremenniks who created the Runecrafting altar were banished from their tribe by the other Fremenniks because they thought magic should only be used by the gods. The banished group went to an island north of Rellekka. These Fremenniks later became the Moon Clan. They must have brought the Stone with them to Lunar Isle as a Rune Essence mine is located there.

The Fremenniks who were not banished started the Runecrafting Crusades, attempting to halt any creation of other runes. Enormous armies went south into kingdoms to destroy the Runecrafting altars. However, they were only able to damage their entrances as the altars their selves stayed intact. When the Fremenniks stopped the crusades, followers of Zamorak went to the Wizards Tower in attempt to take it over, and it was subsequentially burnt down during the battle.

The destruction of the tower resulted in the loss of all Runecrafting knowledge. The humans weren't able to create runes themselves anymore, so the runes became a rare supply once again. With the expansion of the human empires, years later the wizards' tower was built again. And the wizards spent all their time on rediscovering the art of Runecrafting, without any success. But in the Year 169 (the current age), the find of a runecrafting talisman by an adventurer resulted in the rediscovery of Runecrafting. Wizard Elriss of the wizards' tower set up a Runecrafting guild, where the wizards are still researching Runecrafting today.

However, free players can only craft runes up to body runes (using the Runecrafting skill). Also free players are limited in the runes they can find in stores and that can be bought on the Grand Exchange. The two magic stores (in Varrock and Port Sarim) only sell the basic elemental runes, chaos runes, and death runes. The other types of runes can be traded with other players, gotten as drops or spawns, or bought on the Grand Exchange in Varrock.

Used to cast medium and very high level missile spells (Wind, Water, Earth and Fire Blast/Surge ). Can be runecrafted, but only by members after completing Mourning's Ends Part II. Also used in Ancient Magicks and in magic dart

Used in transmutation spells. For example, low level and high level alchemy, superheat and binding. Can be runecrafted, but only by members.

Activity runes

The following runes, Elemental Runes and Catalytic Runes, are given to players who are participating in the Fist of Guthixactivity, Dominion Tower, Barbarian Assault activity, or Stealing Creation activity. They are substitute for other runes. However they can only be used in combat spells. If a player tries to cast a non-combat spell, he or she will receive one of the messages:

The members-only Lunar spellStat Spy can be cast in Fist of Guthix, despite not directly affecting combat.
These runes cannot be dropped. If they are dropped in the Fist of Guthix waiting room, they will be lost immediately. You will have to exit the waiting room and enter again to get them back.

Used to cast high level curse spells and in teleother spells. Can only be player made at the ZMI Ouranian altar but only randomly. The image of Soul talisman and Soul tiara were discovered in the Knowledge Base at one time, but these images have been removed by Jagex.

Combination runes

These runes are members only, and act as one of each of their composite runes. To make them, you will need some elemental runes, a talisman of the same element, and an equal amount of pure essence. You must then take these items to the secondary elemental temple, and then use the elemental runes or talisman on that altar. For example, if you wanted to make dust runes, you would bring air runes, pure essence, and an air talisman to the earth altar; alternatively, you could bring earth runes, pure essence, and an earth talisman to the air altar. The talisman will be consumed as the combination runes are made.

Note:

Crafting combination runes uses one of the talismans, so it is recommended that one only crafts combination runes of the talismans one has the most of. The Lunar Magicks spell Magic Imbue allows a player to craft combination runes without the use of the opposing talisman.

Respawn locations

Here is a short list of respawn locations of runes throughout RuneScape.

Note: The best place to get rune respawns in f2p is in the Dark Warriors Fortress. The northernmost room contains respawns of 5 Earth, Water, Air and Fire runes. The room directly west of this contains 5 Chaos, Mind and Body runes. Players should be wary when approaching this area: Although this a good place for a rune spawn, the Wilderness is nevertheless a player-killing zone. Its not usually crowded and can be a good place for low levelled players to gain a few magic levels on the Dark Warriors!

Trivia

An update fixed a bug in which runes purchased from the Grand Exchange used the image of a pure essence in place of the actual rune in the Grand Exchange collection box.

On June 92010, the images of runes in the inventory and bank were given a graphical revamp which tilted them to an angle, to make them look more 3D. Rune and pure essence were not included in the update.

The true size of Runes can been seen in the Runecrafting Guild, whilst a female wizard makes them float in the air. They can also be seen in true size in a Rune display case in a POH.

Despite the fact that they could be used for combat, runes could be brought into Entrana.